the family of languages spoken by the descendants of Shem, chiefly the Hebrew, Chaldaic, Assyrian, Arabic Phoenician and Aramaic or Syriac. The Jews in their earlier history spoke the Hebrew, but in Christ's time they spoke the Aramaic, sometimes called the Syro-Chaldaic.

The Original Text and Its History.
... The regularity of structure which belongs to the Shemitic languages generally, makes
this omission less inconvenient for them than a like omission would be for ...
/.../barrows/companion to the bible/chapter xiv the original text.htm

Index of Subjects.
... Shalmaneser, 334. Sheminith, 288. Shemitic languages, 175. Shoshannim, Shushan,
and Shushaneduth, 287, seq. Show-bread, 589. Signification of words, 527. ...
//christianbookshelf.org/barrows/companion to the bible/index of subjects.htm

The Poetical Books (Including Also Ecclesiastes and Canticles).
... writers. Many of these peculiar words are Aramean; that is, they are words
current in the Aramean branch of the Shemitic languages. Chap ...
/.../barrows/companion to the bible/chapter xxi the poetical books.htm